


Poción de Amor a la mexicana

by Bookwormmafer



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 10:13:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15410691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bookwormmafer/pseuds/Bookwormmafer
Summary: It's been ten years since the fall of Lord Voldemort and the fight that almost cost him his life. It's been ten years since Severus Snape decided that despite how much he despised human interaction he would take full advantage of social situations including going to the many yearly potions conventions he was invited to each year as Hogwarts Professor.  Enter newly minted potion mistress Hermione Granger, who was invited at her Australian mentor's discretion. It's been five years since she fled England, maintaining barely any contact with anyone other than Harry, and the last thing she expected to find on this trip was her former potions professor, looking like a million bucks





	Poción de Amor a la mexicana

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FawkesyLady (Tarma)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tarma/gifts).



**June 21st 2008**

“This was certainly the last place where I expected to find you.” The deep voice sent a shiver down her spine but years of practice allowed her to remain still and unaffected even if it took all her years of discipline to maintain her occlumency shields in place. While a beach bar in Cancun would have been the last place she expected to meet him, certain circumstances facilitated this encounter. For one the beach bar belonged to the hotel the American Board of Potioneers had commandeer for their annual potion master's convention. Still she had been prepared to meet him at the convention, in a panel or along the venue not exactly at the hotel beach bar.  
“Mr. Snape.” She replied with what she hoped passed for a disinterested tone. He pulled the stool next to her out and motioned for the bartender not appearing offended that she had finally managed to drop the Professor.  
“How’s Australia been treating you?” He asked kindly as a local beer was placed in front of him. Apparently the bartender knew him.  
“Better than England ever did.” She bit back trying but failing at reigning in her hostility. He had not been the one to blame for how things had turned out. He wasn’t even in England when she had exiled herself after things had gone haywire a few years after the war.  
“Was it England that was the problem? Or was it our small corner of the world?” He wondered as he sipped his beer. She shook her head taking a sip of her own drink, a delightfully refreshing margarita that now tasted like ash.  
“A bit of both really.” She surprised herself with the answer. She wouldn’t be rude, she knew better. His name alone carried more weight in this setting despite everything that it had ever carried in her presence. But that didn’t mean she was ready to bare her soul to her former potions professor. He nodded in understanding. She turned to him, surprised and stared. He looked different. Not younger per se but something… lighter perhaps than she had ever seen him even back when she had first started at Hogwarts. She should have expected it, that he would look different, she had changed too. Gone was her bushy hair, now tamed and longer than she had ever worn it before and she had finally overcome the aftereffects of a year on the run and the severe malnutrition it left her with. His intellect had always appealed to her but she had never really considered him handsome until right this moment. She fidgeted nervously and returned her focus to her drink.  
He noticed her fidgeting and held back a sigh. Her presence had surprised him beyond reason. Not that it didn’t make sense. She was bright and it stood to reason that if she had made her way into the field of potion making she would excel at it and be invited to the most prestigious convention in the world. But he hadn’t known she was a potions mistress. He didn’t keep track of his former students, particularly not Hermione Granger or her friends despite her being brilliant. After the war and his convalescence in Ireland and later America, some five years before he allowed Minerva to persuade him to return to the school, he ignored most of everyone. He had heard something or another about the people he assiduously avoided hearing about spoken in the teachers’ lounge in Hogwarts by Neville Longbottom and few other former students that now were a part of the faculty as apprentices and eventually faculty themselves but he hadn’t heard about her at all. What had happened to the last third of the acclaimed golden trio was spoken in the strictest of confidences and hushed tones if it was spoken at all. The only reason he knew she was in Australia was because Minerva had visited her there a few years earlier and asked him to take over some of her duties.  
A splash of color on her forearm caught his attention but he bit his tongue to refrain from asking and clasped his hands around the neck of the bottle to avoid reaching out to stare at the ink that he was sure covered the remnants of a scar that was ten years old.  
The tension mounted between them and she couldn’t handle it anymore. She finished her drink in one long gulp, deposited a few pesos in the tip jar for the bartender and turned a small polite smile in his direction as she stood. “I’m signed in to a couple of the early conferences tomorrow so I should be leaving. Good night.”  
“Good night Miss Granger.” He replied. She nodded and walked away. His eyes trailing her form as she walked slowly back to the hotel. He shook his head and motioned the bartender for a refill while running a hand down his face. 

**June 22nd 2008**

“You terrify the newbies. It has always been your favorite past time.” The voice was gentle, yet with a small hint of reproof.  
“It is not my fault that my reputation precedes me.” He replied turning away from the people filling the lobby and clamoring for the registration tables to come face to face with Alana Smith, Australia’s best potions mistress.  
“I see you haven't managed to terrify one of my own.” She said with a small smile as she fixed her gaze on the slight form of his former student. Instead of falling for her bait and acknowledging just why he wasn’t a terrifying prospect for Miss Granger he continued to watch her. “So that’s what’s been on your mind. Figuring out who could have been her master or mistress.” The grey haired witch smiled. “She came looking for me some five years ago. A slip of a thing. Thought one bad storm would blow her away. Proved me wrong. She was a mistress in her own right a little over two years ago and she was snatched up quickly after that by the australian ministry. Flat out refused to work for them and started her own business to boot. She’s very sought after for medicinal draughts. Most her own inventions. She’s a guest lecturer in various schools too.”  
“Just never imagined she would go down this path.” He muttered softly his mind stuck on feeling something wrong about the informations he had just received.  
“Perhaps you had a far more in depth effect on her than what you’d originally believed.” She replied equally as softly as they both watched as Hermione spotted them and made her way over to them.  
“Mrs. Smith… Pro.. Mr. Snape. Good morning.”  
“Hi Hermione dear. How was your flight in? Tiresome?” The older witch asked. The younger woman nodded and sighed.  
“It was awful. I should have taken you up on your offer and flown out earlier.” Hermione lamented. Alana chuckled warmly.  
“See, you should listen to me more often. I see you’re not quaking in you shoes as the rest of this newbies seem to be.”  
“There’s nothing to be scared of. If you’re here just as a listener then just keep your focus where it should be and if you’re presenting, well it’s kind of late to be nervous about that, there’s not much you can do.” Hermione replied pragmatically. There were a million other possible replies like how she had been on the receiving end of more than just glares from Snape but it would be poor form. There was an unspoken vow amongst those who had fled England after the war about how to interact with each other and bringing up the past in mixed company went against it. Besides her mentor knew she was a Hogwarts graduate, everyone who had looked at her resume knew this and could draw their own conclusions as to why she wasn’t afraid of Severus Snape. Besides she was more worried about anyone realizing that she was incredibly attracted to him. In the light of day she could see what details she had missed the night before. While his hair wasn’t short it wasn’t as long as it had been when she was a student, his face didn’t look gaunt and pale anymore and his body had filled out nicely too, or at least she was finally getting a good look at it as he wore khakis and a t-shirt instead of robes. 

“I gather then that you won’t be joining us for the excursion downtown then?” Hermione asked of her mentor.

“No, I’m not young enough for that anymore and the spa here is lovely and I have a whole day appointment Bye now dears, the group seems to be assembling out front.” The two younger people waved merrily as they made their way down the stairs in tense silence together. They made their way to where the different groups were lining up for the outing and about to say a polite goodbye when they realized they were not only signed up for the same tour they were assigned on the same bus.

Once they were settled alone together in the very back of the bus, Hermione heaved a heavy sigh. “This is utterly ridiculous.”  
“What is utterly ridiculous?” He asked turning his gaze back to her from where he had settled it gazing out the window.  
“This.” She said motioning with her finger between them. “So we know each other, are aware and sometimes even participated in the horrible things that were done to the both of us but that’s all in the past and that's where it should remain. It’s not as if I’m going to go telling anyone and I don’t think you would either.” She finished in a huff.  
He chuckled quietly at her and she was startled into silence by how handsome he looked with an honest smile in his face.  
“So you’re advocating we adapt a ‘let bygones be bygones’ policy?” He answered her with a small smile forcing her away from her staring. She nodded and quickly turned away blushing and feigning a cough.  
“It may be a good idea, we’re bound to meet each other at this kind of events often enough.”  
The ride to the city center and the magical quarter was spent in a more companionable silence.

Plaza 28 is an amalgamation of colorful souvenirs, regional artistry and local liquors, mostly tequila, equally as colorful as the souvenirs and a tourist trap for the most part. It did not make it any less enjoyable. Particularly after a very nice coffee flavoured complementary tequila shot. Hermione giggled girlishly more times than she could remember having ever done so while Severus, who had instructed her to call him thus in the spirit of making peace with the past, couldn’t think of any convention outing he had enjoyed as much as this. Instead of waiting for the rest of the group to finish their souvenir shopping before heading to the magical quarter, Severus approached their assigned tour guide and spoke to him in soft tones about heading to the muggle market before seeing the magical ares, something he knew the rest of the group wasn’t interested in. The tour guide nodded his head remembering Snape from previous years and knowing that he wouldn’t get lost. 

With that taken care of he turned to Hermione with a small smile and escorted her out of the plaza and down the street towards the actual market. In between colorful buildings and stalls lined with seashell decorations, traditionally painted mexican skulls and the scent of a variety of fried foods wafting through the air, the two potioneers found something in each other that they never would have imagined. A kindred spirit. Someone who knew and understood some of the secrets that made them who they were. Slowly but surely they started opening up to each other in between trying different Tequilas and hats and clothing. They reunited with the rest of the tour group on the entrance to the magical quarter a little more tipsy and with more honest smiles that anyone would remember seeing on their faces. 

Their time together came to an unwanted end once back in the hotel where three newly appointed potions masters and mistress and one apprentice were waiting for Hermione to go to dinner and out to the clubs Cancun was so famously renowned for.

 

**June 23rd 2008**

His conference was first in the docket after the official welcome speech and the Board of the Association report of the activities carried out in the last year but no matter how hard she tried to keep her eyes open she could barely manage it as she sipped a strong mexican coffee. Going out the night before had been the worst idea but Alana had insisted that she try to socialize during the convention.  
A vial of something ochre with a soft hint of burnt sugar was thrust into her hand as she was moving her coffee down.  
“Drink it, it’ll make you feel better.” The baritone voice of Severus whispered in her ear. She turned surprised eyes on him. 

“I thought you were anti the use of sobering potions. Madam Pomfrey always brewed the hangover cure for those that were stupid enough to get hammered in school.”

“I’ve never been anti the hangover cure, I just refused to brew it for children that were meant to be studying, besides that’s not a simple hangover cure. It’s my own recipe. It will even out everything in your body in as little as an hour so long as you weren’t trying to drink your own weight in alcohol.” He explained with a frown. 

“I wasn’t. I don’t think.” She whispered and downed the vial, grateful that despite her late night and her hung over state she had managed to make it to breakfast well before the rest of her peers. She doubted he would have approached her with the potion if she was surrounded by others. 

“Perhaps it was not one of your best ideas to sample Mexican delights on the eve of the convention.” He rebuffed her gently. 

“Oh I know, how I know. Alana insisted. I have a hard time saying no to her.”

“You aren’t the only one, I find myself in that position more often than what I would care to admit.” He replied with a small nod. 

“Then I’ll be happy that it isn’t just me that is weak to her perfidious ways.” Her answer to him by surprise giving her a small window to be as brave and bold as the sorting hat knew her to be and she impulsively kissed his cheek. “Thank you for the potion.” She breathed as her lips were separating from his cheek. WIth that she turned on her heel and left the breakfast hall. Since she was letting her inner Gryffindor out to play she may as well go full in so she added a little swing to her hips as she walked. 

He stared after her and had to clear his throat a couple of times before he was finally able to tear his gaze away from her shapely behind. He scrubbed a hand down his face in frustration. This trip was supposed to be how he relaxed and prepared for another year at Hogwarts teaching dunderheads. Damn Alana and her ridiculous notions. 

 

They saw each other through the day but did not get a chance to interact. She had congratulated him warmly after his presentation but she had been shuffled away as soon as he was bombarded with questions from others masters interested in his research. It wasn’t until the convention was over for the day that he finally spotted her alone, examining the place that had been designated for the research poster competition she would be a part of the next day. With a sigh, he approached her, making some shuffling noise with his shoes to avoid surprising her. The last thing he needed was being hexed by Hermione Granger. 

“Preparing for tomorrow?” He asked when she turned to look at his shuffling feet. He stilled his motion, embarrassed at being caught. 

She nodded with a small laugh. “Avoiding the nice fellows I went out drinking with yesterday, more like.” She held back a sigh. “That came off wrong, they’re really nice. I just prefer to keep all my faculties and avoid situations like this morning. Although that cure really helped. You could become a billionaire with that.”

“Who's to say I’m not one already?” He teased, a sexy smirk uplifting the corners of his mouth. Hermione cleared her throat to trap the sigh that threatened to escape her. “Since you are avoiding the other new miscreants would you be opposed to having dinner with me?” His voice sounded confident, almost bored really but there was the slightest hint of pink to his cheeks that she found adorable. She only wished she could control her blush as well as he could. 

“Yes, that sounds good” She glanced down at her outfit, a pretty green summer dress with a ruffled hem.

“If you’re done with your poster we could go...” He trailed off not really sure how to demonstrate that what she was wearing was perfect. She threw a quick glance around before turning back to her poster and with a flick of her wand it shimmers slightly. 

“There, shall we?” She turned to him and smiled at his raised eyebrow. “I’m a little paranoid, what with the stories I’ve heard of some of these events.” She justified herself. He smirked and offered her his arm. 

“I did the same thing for my first few conventions way back...” He smiled gently, a new look for him that she had never seen before. She giggled at his admission without meaning to and he just smiled bigger. 

**June 24rd 2008**

The clear cold water of the Caribbean Sea felt incredible against her skin. Despite it being relatively early, not even 8 am yet, the sun was already beating down making the air and the sand hot but the water was still delightfully cold. A few laps in ocean were a great way to get rid of some of the nervous energy out of her system. Unless of course she was joined by the reason for her anxiety in the almost empty beach. The lithe, strong body of Severus Snape was running on the beach without a shirt on. She kept swimming trying to ignore his presence but as soon as she started swimming to shore he realized it was her and waited for her at the edge of the water. 

“You’re up early.” He commented as she approached. He looked her over in what he hoped was a discreet manner, the blue and black bikini she was wearing contrasting delightfully with her tan skin. She was to busy checking him out to notice that she was being checked out too. 

“Have to be, if I want to be on time for the first conference.” She replied, looking up at him with a soft smile. He nodded and returned her smile. She moved past him towards the lounge chair where she had left her clothes and key card to her room. 

“Have enough time for breakfast?” He asked as she slipped a shirt over her head.

“I’d have to shower and change before being allowed into the restaurant.”

“Room service?” She bit her lip so he hurriedly continued. “It’s a fantastic view from the terrace and you could get ready while the food gets there." He finished.  
Hermione nodded shyly and motioned for him to lead them. 

The rest of that day passed with shared looks and gestures. Throughout the conferences they stole furtive glances almost as much as they shared looks. During the poster presentation he squeezed her hand to reassure her when the nibbling in her lip looked like it had begun to hurt. His gesture calmed her enough to release her lip allowing him to focus again Her nibbling was incredibly distracting. Later, after she was awarded with the first place for her research poster and the group was dispersing she jumped into his arms for a very tight hug and planted a kiss to his cheek. He could not control the blush that rose to his cheeks then. Alana’s quiet chuckle from behind them made Hermione jump away and blush tomato red up to her ears and wave goodbye. 

“Not a word.” He bit out as he left the hall after the younger woman, intent on inviting her to coffee after dinner to allegedly discuss her research but was in fact just because he wanted to spend more time with her. 

**June 25th 2008**

He was there again, this time swimming parallel her instead of running on the beach. This time there was no hesitation on her part to join him for breakfast in his room. She didn’t know what kind of spell this place had woven over them but she would make the most of it while it lasted and stop thinking about all the possibilities, So she gave herself free reign to enjoy his attentions. And he was attentive to her every need. He sat next to her for the presentations, fetched her coffee, water, pastries, led her around with a hand to the small of her back. Things that made her tremendously tingly inside but felt completely natural at the same time.

The day was over ealy in the afternoon meaning the participants were free to relax as they prefered. They were laying back in the adjacent sun loungers next to the pool discussing some of his ideas for a new research project, sipping deliciously prepared margaritas when he turned to her. 

“Would you let me escort you to the closing celebration?” He asked, surprising not just her but him as well. She startled and stared at him through her sunglasses. 

“Are you certain?” She asked as she pulled her glasses up to her forehead and stared directly into his eyes her blush still discernible despite the rosy look the sun had given her. He nodded and took a hold of her hand. 

“Of course I’m certain,” his voice gaining confidence as he gave into his feeling as he had been doing throughout the day and pressed a kiss to the back of her hand. She noded shyly and leaned over to press a kiss to his cheek. Later that night as they said their goodbyes near the elevator to her room he questioned her about saving her a seat to the Tulum excursion. 

“I can’t… I promised Alana I’d go with her tomorrow.” She mumbled regretfully. Ne nodded thoughtfully and smiled.

“I’ll come get you around five to head down to the ceremony then.” He kissed the corner of her mouth, the scent of mint tickling her from the mojitos they had shared by the beach after dinner. 

Once inside her room she used the hotel phone to call Alana’s room. 

“I need to go on a shopping excursion with you tomorrow. I need a new dress for the closing celebration.” She mumbled quietly. Alana’s giggle sounded through the phone. 

“I knew that he still had it! Yes, perfect. Meet me in my room at nine, I’ll have pancakes waiting for you and you’ll tell me everything. Then we’ll go find you the perfect dress.”

**June 26th 2008** 

Severus smoothed his black slacks against his legs as he stood staring at her door, hand poised to knock when the door opened gently to reveal a stunning woman in a deep blue halter flowy dress. Her brown hair cascaded in curls around her shoulders brushing tantalizingly against the golden skin. He swallowed hard before smiling brightly. 

“You look incredible Hermione.” He whispered. 

“So do you.” She replied, her blush intensifying under the light layer of makeup she wore. 

“Are you ready?” He asked offering his hand.  
“Yes… No, wit I thought I heard the door, I need to get my key.” She stammered through her explanation as she turned around. Severus swallowed back his gasp. Her back was mostly bare, the thin halter straps criss crossing at the middle of her back leaving it bare to the small of her back, the skin shimmering in the light. A few seconds later she returned to his side and he reached around her to close her door with a soft thud. 

“Onwards we go.” He joked as he pressed his hand to the small of her back offering his other arm for her to take. 

“Into the lion's den or the vipers nest?” She asked with a laugh. He shook his head amazed and bit his lip to answer that he didn’t know but that he would follow her everywhere. 

Dinner was a exquisite affair. Despite being surrounded by colleagues their attentions was mostly focused on each other through the three courses of gourmet local cuisine. When the speeches were given their hands were clasped gently together. After the organizers had opened the dance for the rest of the participants he led her to the dance floor where they proceeded to dance the night away. He led during the more traditional dances while she showed him the more recent dances. All through the night the tension flowed around them coiling tighter until it exploded into a fiery kiss that left them both breathless, arms wrapped tightly around one another, toes digging in the sand, the waves lapping at their legs. 

“Severus?” Seh breathed hands clinging to his lapels. 

“Yes Hermione?”

“Take me upstairs.”

“As the lady wishes. ” He replied and led her back to his room. 

THE END


End file.
